


The Apple Doesn’t Fall Far from the Tree

by devilinthedetails



Category: PIERCE Tamora - Works, Tortall - Tamora Pierce
Genre: Breaking The Rules, Compromise, Crime & Punishment, Diplomacy, Disrespect, Duty, Father & Son - Freeform, Fealty, Gen, Justice, Perspectives, Politics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-28
Updated: 2017-12-28
Packaged: 2019-02-22 22:27:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,261
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13176510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/devilinthedetails/pseuds/devilinthedetails
Summary: Roald finds freedom in the cracks between the rules. Set after the fight in the stables during Page.





	The Apple Doesn’t Fall Far from the Tree

The Apple Doesn’t Fall Far from the Tree

Bread and water made for an unsatisfactory supper, and, even as he left the mess hall with Owen of Jesslaw, the exuberant boy he was sponsoring this year, Roald’s stomach growled in protest at the meager food it had been given. Fortunately, as soon as Roald had heard that Lord Wyldon’s notion of a fair punishment for the fiasco in the stables entailed sentencing them to bread and water suppers for a week, he had devoted himself to finding a solution that didn’t require him eating minuscule meals for a crime he didn’t commit. 

He felt that his duty as a page sponsor extended to ensuring that Owen (who had also stayed out of the fray even if that was only because Roald had seized both arms to prevent him from charging headlong into the fight) didn’t go hungry in the evenings either. 

In the stream of pages—all too wrapped up in their own sullen thoughts to monitor what those around them were doing—Roald took advantage of the crowd to slip through a door, tugging Owen along with him. Since he predicted that Owen would shout in surprise, Roald placed a palm across Owen’s mouth, which muffled the exclamation Owen inevitably uttered. 

“Where are we?” Owen demanded in a slightly softer voice as Roald dropped his hand. His gray eyes swept over the stone staircase they were standing on, which led down to a courtyard filled with trees and flowers. 

“In the Courtyard of Peace,” Roald answered, leaning against the stair’s iron railing, because he knew that when he stretched out from the edge of the steps he could pick apples from the boughs of an apple tree that had been planted before he was born. “To commemorate the end of the last war with Tusaine, the Tusaine ambassador at that time arranged for an apple tree to be planted here as a symbol of the peace he hoped would grow between the two countries.” 

“Why are we here, Your Highness?” pressed Owen, plainly uninterested in the history of the courtyard. 

“We’re getting a fruit course.” Roald tossed two apples at Owen, who caught them with a frown. 

“Lord Wyldon said we’re on bread and water suppers for a week,” Owen pointed out as if anyone would need a reminder. 

“What Lord Wyldon doesn’t know won’t hurt him.” Roald threw more apples at Owen, who stowed them in his pockets. 

“It’s not him I’m worried about, Your Highness.” Owen’s gray eyes were storms of concern. “It’s us I’m worried about…” 

“Then the same principle applies.” Roald filled his own pockets with apples until they bulged. “What Lord Wyldon doesn’t know won’t hurt us.” 

Before Owen could question this pronouncement, Roald crossed over to the door that opened onto the hallway. As he grasped the brass handle, he shot Owen a meaningful glance. “We’ll keep our little adventure a secret, and if we’ve timed this right, Lord Wyldon won’t even have noticed we were gone. If he did miss us, we’re taking up a new horticultural hobby and certainly aren’t planning to eat the apples in our pockets. Got it?” 

“Got it.” Owen nodded, eyes wide enough to swallow his face. 

As he opened the door, Roald saw that they had indeed timed their exploit well, for as they crept inside, they were able to fall into step behind the last group of pages without detection. 

In his room that night, Roald completed his studies while munching through the apples in his pockets. When he finished his classwork, he still had an apple left, which he chewed on as he read a letter that had arrived that morning from Kally in King’s Reach. Kally’s note was packed with her usual griping about the stringent lessons to which the Countess of King’s Reach (an imperious second cousin of Papa’s) subjected her. Sympathizing with his sister’s complaints, Roald contemplated why his parents had entrusted them to the authority of tyrants. 

Roald was about to pull out parchment and compose a comforting, commiserating response centered around the concept that at least she wasn’t sentenced to bread and water suppers for a week when a knock sounded against his door. Figuring that only Neal of Queenscove would be incorrigible enough to violate Lord Wyldon’s strict prohibition on visiting one another in the evenings and wanting to vent his frustration at Neal for falling into Joren’s trap that hurt everyone but especially Kel, Roald called tersely, “Come in.” 

The visitor wasn’t Neal. It was Papa. 

“Your Majesty.” Wondering morosely if he was in trouble again for the stupid stable fight he hadn’t participated in, Roald rose and bowed, trying to conceal his apple behind his back as he did so. 

“Son.” Papa ruffled Roald’s hair, and Roald interpreted that as a sign that he wasn’t about toe be punished. “Lord Wyldon told me you boys were on bread and water suppers for a week. Nothing was said about apples.” 

“The apple isn’t for supper, Papa.” Roald had discovered that sometimes taking an extremely literal interpretation of rules produced a paradoxical freedom. Contrary to popular belief, princes weren’t above the rules. In fact, they were bound by a baffling array of them in every conceivable circumstance, which meant princes had to be clever at finding ways of sticking to the letter of the law while breaking its spirit if they wanted to have any control over their own lives. 

“It can’t be for dessert either.” Papa’s tone was stern but his eyes were amused. “I believe dessert is banned too.” 

“It’s not for dessert either,” agreed Roald as he finished his apple, grateful for Master Oakbridge’s etiquette lessons that had taught him a way to skirt the rules in this instance. “Technically fruit is a separate course from supper and dessert.” 

“Technically is just a fancy word for rule-breaking,” observed Papa dryly. “Speaking of rule-breaking, Lord Wyldon insists that Keladry of Mindelan is to blame for the fight in the stables.” 

Wanting to berate Neal for attracting the wrong kind of attention to Kel from people in high places, Roald replied as levelly as he could, “To Lord Wyldon, everything is Kel’s fault. He’d accuse her of bringing back the immortals if we didn’t know Carthaki mages were responsible, Papa.” 

“You’re claiming Lord Wyldon is biased, Roald?” Papa arched an eyebrow. 

“Where they’re standing shapes everyone’s perspective, Papa.” Roald, after growing up at court, believed everybody was biased to an extent. “Lord Wyldon wasn’t even standing in the stables when he formed his view.” 

“You were in the stables,” Papa pointed out, and Roald realized that this was the reason Papa, who had started to ask Roald for his opinions on people and situations more in the past year, had come to his room tonight. “What’s your view, son?” 

“The fight was orchestrated by Joren of Stone Mountain.” Roald’s jaw clenched. “In his arrogance, he thinks he’s better than everyone else, but in reality the only thing that sets him apart from a common bully is a certain low cunning.” 

“Imagine meeting a cunning and arrogant Stone Mountain.” Papa’s lips quirked, and Roald recalled how his father often complained of headaches after encounters with the haughty Lord Burchard of Stone Mountain. “It seems the rotten apple doesn’t fall far from the diseased tree.” 

Wondering wearily whether he and Joren were destined to wage the wars of their fathers when Roald would have preferred peace, Roald murmured, “Lord Burchard and Joren probably say the same thing about us, Papa.” 

“No doubt.” Papa smiled slightly. “We’re a very stubborn and disagreeable family.” 

Silence fell between them for a moment and then Papa went on more seriously, “Roald, I’m willing to believe that Joren caused the fight, but Lord Wyldon is convinced that the Girl is to blame, because, in his words, there was never so much brawling before she came.” 

“It’s Joren and his cronies fault that they can’t a girl’s presence in the pages’ wing.” Roald’s chin lifted. “The Girl’s parents also gave her a name since she’s a person, Papa. Her name is Keladry of Mindelan, and it’s proper to call her that, not the Girl.” 

“She’s your friend?” Papa stroked his beard as he considered Roald. “That’s why you defend her, isn’t it?”

Kel was his friend, but since she never wanted favors and just wished to be treated like everyone else (which was one of the traits he most respected in her) Roald responded, “It doesn’t matter whether she’s my friend or not, Papa. It’s fair and polite to refer to her by name.” 

“You’re being stubborn, son.” Papa’s arms folded across his chest. 

“Only because I’m right, Papa.” Without being aware of it, Roald mirrored his father’s posture. 

“It’s not right to disrespect your father, Roald.” Papa shook his head. 

Roald’s forehead furrowed. He didn’t regard anything that had come out of his mouth as particularly disrespectful, but, of course, it would be insolent to insist that he hadn’t been rude. Unable to argue but unwilling to surrender entirely, Roald ducked his head and took refuge in a rote reply the Mithran priests had taught him when he hadn’t even reached his father’s waist. “Then I hope that you’ll pray for me, Papa, as I do you.” 

“I pray for you, your siblings, and your mother every day.” Papa clasped Roald’s shoulders firmly. “That’s why you shouldn’t dishonor me, son.” 

“You dishonor yourself, Papa.” Roald’s temper flared as he twisted out of his father’s grasp. “You don’t need me to do it for you.” 

Roald expected the shock that flashed like lighting across his father’s features to mount into anger but instead it shifted to almost sadness. 

“Sit.” Papa jerked his chin at the the bed. As Roald, knees trembling, obeyed and his father settled on the mattress beside him, Papa added, “Explain what in the name of Mithros you meant by that comment.” 

“I shouldn’t.” Roald toyed with a loose thread in his blanket. He had never confronted his father about putting Kel on probation, and now that he was calming down, he remembered that there was an excellent reason for that: it would only end in an argument that would change nothing. 

“You can’t make a remark like that, Roald, and then refuse to clarify it.” Papa laid a stilling hand over Roald’s fingers, and Roald stopped fiddling with the loose thread. 

“I shouldn’t have made the remark in the first place.” Ashamed, Roald lowered his head. 

“You’re right; you shouldn’t have.” Papa tilted Roald’s chin up so their eyes locked. “Since you did, you must explain what you meant. Now please.” 

“You let Lord Wyldon place Kel on probation, Papa.” Roald allowed the suppressed words to tumble from his mouth at last. “You’re her king, and the laws of fealty go both ways. She wanted to serve you as your proclamation permitted, but you wouldn’t defend her right to do so. I don’t know if she’ll ever forgive you for that.” 

“Has she told you that?” A knot tied in Papa’s forehead. 

“No, Papa.” Roald shook his head, thinking that he could read Kel well enough to recognize that all she wanted was to be treated justly according to the laws of fealty. “She didn’t have to for me to grasp that, though.” 

“You understand her well, and that’s good. A prince should understand those who will one day serve him.” Papa was stroking his beard again. “I’m afraid you don’t understand my perspective very well at all, however, and a son should before he judges his father harshly.” 

“What’s your perspective, Papa?” Roald felt he deserved a reprimand more than an explanation but Papa clearly was determined to offer one. 

“I didn’t want Keladry of Mindelan to be put on probation, but it was a diplomatic necessity.” Papa pinched the bridge of his nose. “You know how you have to sit with someone you don’t care for such as Joren of Stone Mountain sometimes because duty demands it?” 

“Yes, I have to sit with everyone at least occasionally, or else I’d be favoring those I sit with and slighting those I don’t.” Roald bit his lip as he identified a pitfall in his father’s analogy. “I’m sacrificing myself, though, Papa. I’m not sending somebody to take my place.” 

“That’s true, but when you’re king, your negotiations will involve more lives than your own as mine do, Roald.” Papa squeezed Roald’s shoulder. “In the case of Keladry of Mindelan’s probation, I thought it was a fair price to pay to keep Lord Wyldon as a training master, and I gambled that his honor would compel him to permit her to remain as a page if she met the conditions of her probation. I believed that I knew him and how he would act.” 

“I see why you agreed to Kel’s probation.” Roald massaged his temples, thinking that he did understand his father’s action even if he still didn’t approve of it. “I just don’t like the idea of negotiating with other people’s lives, Papa.” 

“Nor do I, son, but you know my answer to that.” Papa kissed Roald’s crinkled forehead. “Being royalty means doing a long list of things that you dislike because it’s your duty.” 

“I promise to become a very good diplomat if I have to negotiate with other people’s lives,” whispered Roald. 

“I don’t doubt you’ll be a great diplomat.” Papa pulled Roald into a hug against his chest. “You’re much more of a natural diplomat than I am.”


End file.
